$1000 dollar bonuses for all CWB Staff

[AdamSmith]

Reliable word has it that the CWB Board of Directors have awarded the entire CWB staff with a generous Xmas bonus!

Performance Bonuses you ask?

Nope!

Extra compensation for all the stress and suffering the Conservatives have inflicted on the CWB and the Staff.

That's right. Create a false crisis, whine about the mental anquish it is placing on the staff and then pay them a grand each from the pockets of others!

That's $500 large, completly unearnerd, fellow farmers straight out of yours and my pockets into someone elses.

Doesn't this just say it all.

So I guess we all know who's money they think it really is, and it's not the growers of the grain that's for sure!

What's the word I'm looking for here?

Is it;

A) Audacious
B) Contemptuous
C) Brazen
D) Shameless
E) All of the above.

[BennyHin]

I see the newly appointed directors are already leaking corporate information to their buddies.

It appears from your postings that market economies and individuals are motived to earn profit (capital).

Dont you think salaried workers might also be? Talk to your city cousins.. see what they say (that is if you have enough time between snowmobiling and curling, and surfing the web, I hope you dont claim your internet connection as a taxable expense)

[grainboy]

Let me get this straight, you are complaining that the staff get a $500 bonus? GET A LIFE.... Its called the real world to keep an employee you have to treat said employee well.

[grainboy]

Is this for real??

I hope this was a early April fools Day joke!! Wake up all you CWB supporters!!

I just got my final payment today for LAST YEARS CROP(could you imagine if you sold Canola and got paid for it a year later), anyway I got a final payment on my #3hrsw for $1351.19, and on a thirteen hundred dollar cheque I had $50 deduction for Wheat & Barley Research, and a $30 adminstration charge.

Who are they kidding if I got a charged for Wheat & Barley research ..... I demand a refund!!!

Because obviously the research didn't work to well did it?

[grainboy]

Grainboy they're getting bonus money WITH MY MONEY. AS MUCH AS THEY THINK IT'S THEIRS IT ISN'T!!

[AdamSmith]

The point is Benny and grainboy This money is not their's to dole out however they see fit, if the directors had ponied up the $1000 x 500 employees = $500 thousand fine.($500 large is $500,000.00)

The lack of respect for other peoples property is astonishing.

I pray for the day I will never have to associate myself with the likes of these people ever again.

[timm]

we'll be surfin in Hawaii when the agri energy paradigm kicks in and the wheat board is kicked out

[AdamSmith]

Snappy, Yep it's for real

CWB OFFERS $1,000 BONUSES
Meant to recognize stress and strain
on employees
BY PAUL SAMYNWinnipeg Free Press
OTTAWA • The Canadian Wheat Board is handing out $1,000 Christmas bonuses to its 500 employees in recognition of the “stress” and “strain” they have been under during the Winnipeg-based agency’s fight with the Harper government.


The special payout was announced to staff yesterday morning by board chairman Ken Ritter and newly-minted president Greg Arason, whom Agriculture Minister Chuck Strahl appointed onTuesday.


However, the bonus is not only raising the concern of farmers, but also among CWB employees who are wondering whether it is “hush money” designed to buy their silence in what has become a pitched political battle over the future of the world’s largest marketer of wheat.


“The whole thing was really quite surreal,” one employee said of the announcement in the cafeteria. “One moment we are locked in a battle with the government and 24 hours after our very popular president [Adrian Measner] is fired, we are told we are getting $1,000 bonuses. Is this hush money? Am I supposed to abide by a new president’s rules which are contrary to what this company has always been about?”


The payout was authorized by the CWB’s directors during their first meeting withMr. Arason on Wednesday and has the blessing of those who have beenadvocating for the retention of its marketing monopoly.


“We have had a tremendous strainonour staff as it has had to work inanorgan ization that has been on the front pages of newspapers,” said Ian McCreary, a director from Saskatchewan.


“It is a tokenof the board and farmers’ appreciationfor working in an environment that has been attacked by the government of Canada.”


Bill Toews, a director from Manitoba, said the optics of the bonus and how farmers might view it were all factored into the board’s decision.


“The rationale was the staff have undergone a lot of stress and worked under very difficult conditions that have been imposed on them by what Mr. Strahl has done,” Mr. Toews said.


“If farmers are concerned about what we did [authorizing the bonuses], they will have to place that responsibility on Mr. Strahl, not the board.”


While any number of private and public sector companies provide Christmas bonuses for employees, that has not been the traditionpre viously at the CWB.


The payouts come as Mr. Arason, Mr. Strahl’s pick to head the CWB as interim president and CEO, is running up against a board controlled by directors opposed to the Tory promise to move to openmark eting of wheat and barley. Mr. Strahl sacked Mr. Measner for refusing to toe the Tory line onopenmark eting.


Mike Bast, chairmanof the WesternCan adianWheat Growers Association, which backs the Tory visionfor the CWB, was shocked by the bonuses.


“I think farmers would find this very upsetting right now,” Mr. Bast said.


“If you are going to pay the employees a $1,000 bonus, why aren’t farmers paid a $1,000 Christmas bonus cheque as well?”


Mr. Bast said if the CWB was really anorgan ization that represented prairie producers, it would have done a quick survey of farmers to ask them if they agreed employees deserved the $1,000 bonus.


Mr. Strahl’s office wouldn’t comment directly on the bonuses, saying it stays out of the dayto-day running of the board.

[cowman]

Well I've heard of a lot of corporate performance bonuses...but never a "stress" bonus!
Usually a bonus is for doing a good job and making the company more profitable? When it looks like in fact the company is going out of business...does it make sense to hand out a bonus? Is this sort of like "eat,drink and be merry...for tommorrow we die"?
I hope all you old farmers out on the prairies enjoy buying all your CWB employees a nice $1000 Christmas present? Maybe a new plasma TV? Or the airfare to Mexico for some fun in the sun? You are very generous people!LOL

[BennyHin]

Unlike (some) farmers like you, salaried workers pay INCOME TAX. Bonuses are taxable at approx. 50%, so net payment on $1000 is $500. The other $500 goes to help pay for farm support programs.

If you are unfamiliar with the term income tax, see here:

http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/tax/individuals/menu-e.html

[BennyHin]

previous comment was directed to cowman.

[lesm]

what a arrogant, out of control, useless organization with no one to answer to. announcing a $1000 stress and strain bonus for employees while deceasing my wheat pro.

[lesm]

BennyHin, It doesn't matter if they pay 70%tax on that bonus, I don't know how a dollar works on your farm but a gross dollar is still a gross dollar that is being paid, and that number is $1000.00. I don't care how much they keep it's still a $1000.00 OF OUR MONEY NOT THEIRS!!!!!

[cowman]

Benny: I suspect I pay a hell of a lot mores taxes than you? Do you think I only make a few bucks on a few old cows?
And yep I probably pay more income taxes than Measener and Ritter!

[silverback]

That is so friggin outrageous I want to puke!

How long do you suppose this was in the works before the new guy gets in?

That's half a million dollars Ben! Out of our grain cheques! Hello!

The PRO's suck against the world prices and you think this is good? Wow, what a great country we live in.